Concept

Religion

Analysing, even if only briefly, the religiosity of the Basques past and present requires a prior atisation of the cultural stages through which this group has passed throughout its history. Julio Caro Baroja offered a first approximation in his well-known work Los Vascos (1949) that is considered valid:

  1. The Franco-Cantabrian cycle of the hunter-gatherer peoples of the Upper Palaeolithic.
  2. The coastal cycle of the hunter-gatherer peoples of the Epipalaeolithic and Early Neolithic.
  3. The Pyrenean cycle of the farming and pastoral peoples of the Late Neolithic and Bronze Age.
  4. Basque cycle of the farming and pastoral peoples of the early Iron Age. Cremation practices. Monuments: cromlechs and burial mounds in pastoral areas. Urns in caves.
  5. Cantabrian-AQUITAIN cycle of the early Christian era.
  6. Roman colonial cycle: 1st-5th centuries AD.
  7. Early medieval Basque cycle: 5th-9th centuries AD.
  8. Central medieval Basque cycle: 9th-13th centuries AD.
  9. Late medieval Basque cycle: 14th-15th centuries AD.
  10. Modern Spanish-French cycle: 16th-18th centuries AD.
  11. Contemporary cycle: 19th-20th centuries.

Emeterio de Sorazu (1979), for the purposes of religious categorisation, atises the pre- and post-Christian cultural phenomenon as follows:

  1. In the Cantabrian-Aquitanian cycle, religion and magic are recognised by these elements: Lunar worship (full moon) expressed through dances. Abundant vocabulary taboos. Development of local cults. Animal and human sacrifices. Gymnastic and war dances with religious meaning. Augural practices. Chthonic divinities, of springs, mountains, trees, places.
  2. In the Roman colonial cycle, new imported religious and magical elements emerged: Urban cults and Greco-Latin mythical conceptions with folkloric reflections (‘lamiñak’). New magical practices surrounding the world of witches (‘sorgiñak’).
  3. In the early medieval Basque cycle, the religiosity of the natives received a colonising wedge from the south of the Basque Country: the introduction of Christianity. Creation of patronage churches. Determination of ancient dioceses. Paganism persisted somewhat in the north.
  4. In the central medieval Basque cycle, the progress of Christianity approached the north. Spread of certain devotions (in relation to pilgrimage routes). Formation of ideas concerning the ‘gentiles’ (of much older origin) and their peculiar characteristics (their relationship with dolmens and cromlechs). Pagan-Christian religious syncretism.
  5. In the late medieval Basque cycle, the establishment of Christianity throughout the Basque country predominates. Development of parishes. Adjustment of religious ceremonies to municipal life. Local spread of some heresies.
  6. In the modern Spanish-French cycle: there was great activity in the fight against heresies and those that arose within Catholicism in Spain and France (prominent Basque figures of Jesuitism and Jansenism). Violent repression of collective, rural, witchcraft-type movements and their reinterpretation. A final cycle, the contemporary one, would be characterised by the breakdown of the religious ‘unity’ imposed by Catholicism and the massive collection of information on those pre-Christian religious elements that still survived.